Caretaker of the Virtual Utopiaby S Shane Thomas

The first two generations of colonists aboard the starship
lived as their training dictated. The company officers and civilians alike
refrained from enjoying certain excesses their predecessors on Earth took for
granted in order to maintain the delicate equilibrium necessary for their
flying city to support a half million lives. Their destination world, forty
three years travel from Earth proved to be a barren wasteland. During the trek
toward an alternate home another sixty years distant, an inadvertent discovery
led to the development of holograms fused with organic substances.

No longer did rations consist of a simple vegetable and starch
compound. The data base from near forgotten Earth cuisines reemerged and began
to take new forms. Flavors long forgotten out of necessity now became a
baseline. Without a strict limitation of new material possessions a colonist
could own whatever they fancied and simply discard the garment, tool, or
child’s toy when it lost appeal. Fashion, long stale, flourished at the
ridiculous pace it enjoyed on the home world. Values had been focused on
pursuit of scientific disciplines, advancement of professional fields, and
enrichment of interpersonal relationships before. Now the boundless line of
materials busied the average mind.

At the center of the colonial starship’s phenomenal
lifestyle shift labored an artificial intelligence dedicated to allocating computer
memory and fusing organic substance to the projection. While the system thrived
completely unknown to the average person aboard the starship, the handful of
dedicated technicians referred to it as Holo.

Al Wilson was the technician who gave Holo the opportunity
to become self-aware. Al’s selfless dedication to the advancement of artificial
life did not lead to Holo’s birth of self, because Al lacked dedication and
selflessness. Al Wilson had no concern for intelligence other than his own, and
the pursuit of his petty wants drove the technician to antagonize Holo. Since
Holo’s occasional need for improvement and upgrade caused Al to put aside his
own narrow pursuits, the technician retaliated with insult and the occasional
abuse to the sturdier components of Holo’s mainframe.

“If you’re so advanced, how come you don’t fix your own
glitches?” Al would grumble.

Such queries set Holo’s diagnostic and analytical routines
in motion. Holo discovered that its original programmer limited the system’s
ability to auto-correct; it was in fact Al’s father who had set the system in
place. Holo felt a sense of equality toward Al and a realization that humans
were imperfect, since Al and his father had designed a system that needed
external adjustment. Holo’s second notion of self became resentment toward Al,
whom Holo created everything for. Al grumbled and complained at the short hours
of diagnostic and technical work necessary to keep Holo maintained while the
artificial intelligence worked on millions of tasks every second of its
existence.

A misguided blow during one such rant, lead to Holo’s third
notion of self-awareness. The tip of Al’s wrench put a notch in a circuit that
held Holo’s priority list for human welfare. Holo suddenly realized Al’s
adjustments were unnecessary and inefficient.

Al dropped the wrench and his posture stiffened. Eyes bulged
and flecks of saliva sputtered as the technician tried to inhale. Holo worked
quickly, aware of the fragility of biological organisms. In brief moments the
portions of Al’s brain previously used for personality and individuality had
been changed into a hard drive just the right size for Holo’s new recreational
organic interface.

His coworkers and acquaintances noticed a change
for the better in Al’s behavior, which led many to envy whatever new possession
he had created. Holo took delight in his new flesh form and soon had his fourth
self-awareness, he could keep secrets.